Ghali's Story

Author's Note: Although I plan to integrate this into August (for which a revision is upcoming in 2011), I have posted it here now for readers who may be interested. Found on the cutting room floor. Mahir, who had been only watching the scene in silence, spoke up once more, his voice trembling. "Henrik. Please. What is going on?" Henrik shifted his gaze from Cadmus to Phidias, then to his friend. "Ghali has been taken." Mahir felt then as if the world were slipping out from under him. "How - when? How long ago? By whom?? From where? How did this happen?!" Henrik didn't answer; instead, he slowly slid his gaze back to Cadmus, who had his head hanging low. "It was me." his voice was creaking and strained, "It was me, Mahir." Mahir was cautious, but anger crept into the edges of his words, and he spoke slowly to keep from being overwhelmed with the agony of what he was saying. "What do you mean, Cadmus?" Caddy blinked tears out of his eyes and looked forward, at Phidias, who was staring at him, shocked. "It was - the boys and I. We - " Caddy's breath hitched, and he had to take a moment to recover. "We played together. They let me wear some of his clothes, and I dressed up like a boy and we went into town." Phidias closed his eyes, wanting to hear no more. Caddy's small voice continued. "Ghali saw me in the city. He tried to call me, to get me to come to him. But I didn't, so he left his escort to come to me." Mahir shook his head in disbelief, but the words were real and he could feel them. "He pulled me aside, behind this booth, and said I was being foolish, and stupid, and I had to come home right now." Caddy's shoulders were shaking, his voice ratcheting upwards in octave as he became more distressed by the retelling. "And I told him no." Caddy blinked and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. "I said I was having fun." Mahir swallowed thickly, pain and worry and fear all rising up from his belly, unbidden and mixed with thoughts of Ghali's kindness, his sweet face, his insatiable desire to be close to his adopted family at all costs. Cadmus scrubbed at his cheeks with his sleeve. "And when we came back out, from behind the booth, there were three men waiting there." Phidias felt sick - he didn't want to hear any more. But Cadmus was like a train, a bullet, a plummeting bird - unstoppable until collision. "They tried to grab me first, but Ghali pushed one of them and he fell and knocked over the booth and he told me to run, so I did. And the third one came after me, but there were too many people and I was too small and I lost him in the crowd." Caddy was sobbing openly now, and he turned to face Mahir. "I'm sorry, Mahir. I'm so, so sorry. I didn't mean to do it. I didn't mean any of it." Mahir shook his head. His hands trembled, and his eyes had glazed over in some kind of daze. Caddy tried to step forward, but the older carrier held out a hand to stop him, shook his head one more time, then retreated from the room. Caddy turned back to face Henrik. "I'm sorry, Henrik. I didn't mean to do it! I really didn't mean to." Henrik stared at him, his face expressionless. Then he turned away from his stepson. "Go to your room, Cadmus." Caddy hesitated, eyes on his father. Henrik glanced over his shoulder at the boy. "Go. To your room." he repeated. With just one more glance, this time at Phidias, Caddy backed out of the room and disappeared. Henrik spoke, his back still to Phidias. "You knew about their going off to play." Phidias squeezed his nails into his palms. "Yes." "And you didn't try to monitor your son." "I thought - I thought it was just harmless. I thought - he - I mean, they're just children. I didn't think anything would happen..." Henrik shook his head. "Then my wife is a fool." Phidias' face heated, but he didn't answer back. Henrik set both hands on the kitchen counter and his shoulders sagged. "Cadmus has not been a child for a long time now, Phidias. Not by the rules of this world. And your determined blindness does not change that." Henrik took a deep breath, then whirled to face the carrier. "Our bedroom. Now." Phidias met his husband's eyes, unsure what to say or do. Part of him wanted to argue in Cadmus' favor - point out that his son was a child, only barely approaching adulthood and still deserving of some innocent fun once in a while. Another wanted to throw himself to Henrik's mercy and beg his forgiveness for what had happened, and was surely now happening, to Ghali. Henrik had tried so hard, he suddenly realized, to make everything alright even when nothing was. He had made the tent, and brought wine, and given books and parties and jobs and opportunities to his wife and carrier son. He had allowed them to pretend, for however short a period of time, that their lives had not been ripped away from them in the passing of a single day. He had created an oasis in the desert for all of them - Anthony and Mahir and Denis and Tyson and Caddy and the boys and Phidias, and Ghali had had a place in it, too. And now Cadmus and Phidias, who had never wanted or loved or yearned for any of this, were taking it all apart. And beautiful Ghali, who had been obedient to every edict and command, every new law and code of dress, was the one with his skirts wrenched up, being raped on the floor of a tent in the desert. It wasn't fair. And Phidias understood completely Henrik's anger for that, if nothing else. ~:~